blind and aware
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: Ritsuka remembers his sixth birthday. The last one he had with Seimei…


**fandom - Loveless**  
 **title - blind and aware.**  
 **rating - pg**  
 **pairing - seimei + ritsuka, soubi + ritsuka, seimei + soubi implied**  
 **description – Ritsuka remembers his sixth birthday. The last one he had with Seimei…**

 **Disclaimer - Loveless isn't mine and Runaway is by Susy Wender.**

 **blind and aware.**  
 **By miyamoto yui**

The heat of the summer shined into the little boy's eyes.

It's glaring almost in irony as he shaded his eyes with his hand saluting at the intense brilliance. He looked like a tiny soldier caught off-guard by the familiar voice that suddenly asked him,

"Is there a secret hideout small enough for only the two of us, Ritsuka?"

"Hmm, Seimei?"  
The adorable, rumpled little boy smiled while burying himself into the covers when he blinked his eyes to wake up from the eerie tone in his dream. It was as if he was soaked in icy water ready to be frozen alive because he was numb with shock.  
The older brother with a small smug expression forming on his lips held onto the boy as soon as he sat on the edge of the bed. His long fingers enveloped around the young boy as his chest warmly pressed against the boy's back. He hovered over him like he was trying to protect the child from harm. His cheek pressed onto the little boy's tenderly.

But had the little boy really heard what he thought he did? Was it really in his dream? Somehow, he wasn't so sure. That dark, ominous voice of foreboding _couldn't_ have been _his_ brother. No, not in the slightest!

The temperature was rising consistently through the ventilators. The heat was oozing, even to the pores of their cheeks, making their skin almost melt into one another. But even when Seimei slightly gestured that he was getting up to go downstairs, his little brother grunted in displeasure, complaining that he was too tired and wanted to be hugged even longer.  
The older brother could do nothing but comply to such a cute, yet sticky request. His arms squeezed tighter around the child with his lips brushing against the child's naked shoulder blade since Ritsuka had decided to wear his shirt. Of course, it looked too frumpy and big on him.

Drowning, drowning…and it was no longer from the heat of the skin, but that inside a slightly opened furnace heart wanting to sear anything around it…  
To become closer than virtuously possible-

"Seimei."

The older brother opened his eyes at the call back into reality and calmly sat up with a composed visage. "I was here to wake you up and you're making me go back to sleep."

The young, hazy-eyed Ritsuka turned over to his back with his brother's half-turned sitting figure leaning forward with his hands to either side of the boy's tiny waist. Ritsuka put his crossed hands over his mouth as if keeping a secret, but the brightness of his smiling eyes couldn't be turned off.  
"It's your fault if mom scolds you this time."  
At this, the little boy's eyes became frightened.

Suddenly, a shadow had taken over.

Seimei immediately started to tickle him. He knew the reaction that ensued after mentioning their mother, but he did it anyway. 'Saving him' until his little brother washed over to nothing but him? Maybe. But there was something so wonderful in teasing his number one love.

This was the single torture that enflamed his hungry, absurd, and wicked pleasure…  
…and made him react to anything in the world around him.

Only this alone.

The child's guiltless laughter filled the air like bells ringing and the teenager took this as a definite sign of his unblemished nature. He was a flower. A rose, to be exact. It protected itself from harm with the sharpness of its beauty, but hurt itself too by being unable to distinguish what and what not to keep away.  
When he finally got up and walked towards the door, Seimei pushed Ritsuka towards the bathroom while grabbing Ritsuka's clothes form his desk chair. He caught a glimpse of his sleepy brother leaning forward like a zombie with the shirt that barely covered his shorts so much that it looked liked he had nothing underneath.  
The older brother smiled widely as he closed the door behind him, almost wanting to stay and observe.

Ritsuka's eyes wandered to the door that was still partly open. They locked eyes for a moment, exchanging a glance filled with affection that bordered on indecency if an outsider looked upon them at that particular moment...

When Seimei was downstairs, their mother was finishing up breakfast and she patted Seimei's ears until she touched them slowly with her right index finger and thumb. She didn't say anything but to announce his name in a far off manner with a melancholic grin that tipped in the direction of suspicion and favor. Now, as to which, Seimei couldn't really decide, so he just nodded his head at his mother with a proper, cleanly dry grin. He patted her delicately on the shoulder, suggesting that she better go out shopping for a certain dish he really wanted that day.  
Since Seimei rarely asked for anything, his mother complied with a smile wider than the last. "Since you asked." With that response, she left a few moments before Ritsuka came out of the shower.

By the time Ritsuka came down after his morning shower, their mom was gone.

"Let's go out."

Ritsuka was at a loss. He was wiping his hair and cat ears, but his brother placed his large hands over his little ones. Why did Seimei always have to do this from behind, he wondered. But with their fingers almost intertwined, Seimei tipped forward just a little to smell Ritsuka's freshly-washed hair.

The little boy didn't know what to do. He wanted to go out with his brother and get away from home, but it was really cold. But it was rare that there was no one home, so couldn't he stay at home and be comfortable for once inside of it?  
His mixed feelings subconsciously came out through his semi-clingy fingers.

Seimei took them up and kissed them before putting the towel on Ritsuka's shoulders.

"We'll do whatever you want. It's your birthday today. I took the day off just for you."  
Ritsuka's eyes closed for a moment. Only Seimei would remember something insignificant like that. He refused to cry. His heart was very touched at how his brother always thought of him. That's why he himself couldn't think of anyone else.

There was no room in his heart to do so.

"Thank you for remembering…." He opened his eyes, but stared at the door before them.

"Why do you have to thank me for something like that?" Seimei's fingers ran along the outline of Ritsuka's shoulders like a fire guided by a single gasoline trail. He hugged his shoulders for the second time that day. "It's really cold today, so we'll pretend it's summer, shall we?"  
Ritsuka rose one eyebrow. His brother would only do these odd things for him. He began to smile shyly. He really did love how cool his brother was.

Only he could come up with strange stuff like that…

But in the back of his mind, that voice beckoned him further. It was a bit more demanding when he replayed the sensuous whisper that startled him to wake up that morning:

 _"_ _ **Is**_ _there a secret hideout small enough for only the two of us, Ritsuka?"_

The 'is' implied a 'will there ever be'.

"Since it's really hot…I'll make it snow." Seimei pretended to fan himself because of the heater. Ritsuka giggled at how silly his brother acted just for him. From the freezer, his older brother brought out an ice cube rack with three kinds of colors in it: cherry, lime, and lemon.

"We can eat this while walking."

Ritsuka shook his head as they both got their jackets, left a note for their mom and left with mittens, gloves, and scarves. He laughed as he looked up to his tall brother while holding onto his gloved hand. Each of them had a toothpick and licked a different color. Ritsuka squinted his eyes because of the sourness of the lemon and Seimei chuckled a bit while eating through the cherry-flavored ice cube.

They held their flavors out to one another and licked each other's ice cube. They both grimaced at how the other could like such a thing.

"What to do? Oh what to do…" Seimei's voice trailed off in a fake confused manner while smiling down at Ritsuka. Ritsuka's six-year-old hand held out a toothpick in the middle of all the warm yarn. "What do you like to do when it's summer?"

"Playground!" Ritsuka began to pull him towards the white park.

The blanket of embedded snowflakes overtook everything. Hardly anyone was out on this very cold Sunday, but the two brothers went towards the playground. Patting the ground, Ritsuka and Seimei tried to make a snow castle while pretending it was sand. Quietly, but smiling, like sculptors, they tried to shape the whiteness within the boundary of their hands.

And this was something that their mother or anyone else couldn't break even if they tried their hardest. Even themselves…

Seimei brought out a water bottle from his shoulder bag and opened the cap to pour some into Ritsuka's mouth. Some dribbled down the side of his face and he wiped it away with the back of his gloves, touching the warmly patched cheeks lovingly.  
Ritsuka worked earnestly and Seimei put the water bottle away. They exchanged words in small glimpses: Secrets of a structure only they shared to one another.

When Ritsuka fell back and sat on the snowy ground with a loud, satisfied sigh, his brother walked around the snow castle they created together. It was rectangular shaped with towers at every corner.

In the middle was a simple, square box. Ritsuka pointed at it and smiled up while saying, "That's where we live."  
"Where, Ritsuka?" Seimei teased as if he didn't know what Ritsuka was showing him.  
Seriously, Ritsuka knelt beside the castle and pointed at the square box while giving an infectious grin. "You and I live _here_."

The older brother was no longer paying attention to their creation. Looking straight at the little boy, he questioned, "Only the two of us?"

Ritsuka turned his head to find his older holding his breath for his answer. It was a tinge of sadness he hadn't ever seen. His impenetrably strong brother? Was he like him? No, not Seimei. Not at all…

He nodded his head without the words to express all the mature thoughts going through his child mind.

Seimei's head bent forward to hide his eyes and true expression from Ritsuka. But his hand touched the top of Ritsuka's head with his right pinky and thumb touching both of Ritsuka's furry, sensitive ears.

The overwhelming heat of that touch made Ritsuka wince and close his eyes while Seimei answered, "The more you want to come closer to me, the more you'll want to get away. And you will forget this day, but I won't."

"Why do you always say things like that?" Ritsuka blurted out in a frustrated, hurt tone. He crunched his eyes and put his hands each in fists that dug his fingernails through the mittens and into his palms mercilessly.

The masochistic words he said to Ritsuka both exhilarated and saddened Seimei.

Darkly, the voice of the dream coincided with this one:  
"Runaway from me, Ritsuka."

 **++/++/++/++**

"Seimei?"

In the center of all the pandemonium passing through his head and the shouts of the children running across the sandy beach, a man turns his head at the name he wants to remember and forget at the same time. On this very day, on the 15th of July, when things are at their hottest, a single drop of rain falls from a twelve-year-old boy's left eye as he suddenly remembers his brother. He's sucking on the red popsicle his handsome, blond companion bought for him.

"Ritsuka…" Positioned like a bird lover, the man's index finger wipes the boy's tear away carefully. "What are you thinking about?"

"My birthday." Ritsuka's eyes helplessly search among the waves that come back and forth, paralleling his confused emotions. They were all there, not knowing where to go.  
His mouth drinks in the dessert that palely looks like blood…

"It's a hot day, isn't it?" Soubi asks while taking Ritsuka's chin to focus on him completely. He laughs, "Think about cold weather! The power of suggestion is an awesome thing."

His question is meant to avert Ritsuka's pain, but he knows that the distraction will only anger his beloved. He wants to confront the situation, but also wants to divert the answer, afraid of what Pandora's box will set forth.

He brought him here as a vacation from the world and their thoughts, but it only thrust them back into the realities of their situation…

The boy pouts at the umpteenth time the man changes the subject without wanting to deal with the image that always stands between them.

Soubi gets up, tips over the huge umbrella and carries Ritsuka into his arms. He tries to smile softly at him while walking towards the water as Ritsuka protests with an embarrassed, crimson face. Ritsuka laughs out of the ridiculousness. "Are you crazy or something?!"  
"Only about you." Looking down at him, Soubi winks mischievously.  
Ritsuka looks away, but ends up watching the waves that continue to roll in with the wind blowing slightly harder. There are people walking around, chatting mindlessly while he worries over the fate his brother told him would make or break the person he'll become.

The one he's starting to recognize and accept as 'himself'…

Soubi doesn't care about anything as he watches Ritsuka shamelessly. He knows that this won't last forever…

…Change has already started to lift its claws, supported by Fate's enthusiasm…

Ritsuka's fingers hold onto Soubi's beige, sleeveless shirt as he stares more and more at the ocean. Mindlessly, he comments,

"Because of that, you'll do anything for me…  
…won't you, Soubi?"

Soubi becomes a little wide-eyed, disturbed at the coldness searing his heart and instantly tearing at the seams of the fragile mends left by his last master. This voice overlaps with the teenager whom he gave his soul to on an untarnished, silver platter to be eaten whole.

And now, with the same Aoyagi blood running through the veins of his sacrifice, the boy rapes his heart with that harsh statement once said seriously by Seimei. The innocent voice deepens the cut that will start to bleed from that moment on.

In this instant, summer is ending. The carefree ways of their relationship are transforming, floating butterflies caught in nets to be later slaughtered on a frame for everyone to see.

To the boy, the warmest period of the year is cooling down into winter.  
To the man, the rising heat will surely burn them now.

The rose-colored world within summer's realm is slowly fading away…

Again and again, the boy's own words repeat in his mind as he imagines the winter air crashing against his hot cheeks while he holds Seimei's face in between his uncovered hands. He sees himself kissing Seimei innocently on the lips on his sixth birthday.

 _"I can't run away from you, Seimei. I just can't."  
Hand in hand, they ran back home before their mother came home to chastise them, pouring in screams._

Soubi turns away from the sea with Ritsuka in his arms, holding him closely with the chaos deafening his ears. Ritsuka blushes more and more while scolding him, defying the orders to put him down and let him go.

"Not yet," he shouts inside of his mind.  
"Don't grow up, Ritsuka. We're not ready yet."

Then, Ritsuka becomes quiet.  
Somewhere, he hears someone singing. It is a song Seimei used to sing to him at night when thought he was already sleeping. Worriedly, he turns his head and searches desperately at the faces among the crowd.

"I close my eyes and dream you're mine.  
I want you here forever.  
I need you all the time.

Runaway, forever I can't live without your love.  
Runaway, don't let me wait another night alone…"

The sun is slowly changing shades to walk towards the guillotine called the horizon.  
Blind and aware, simultaneously.

 **Owari.**

Sunday, August 28, 2005  
2:36 AM


End file.
